G-d Is a Chocolate Sundae

Last week's doubled Torah portion was Nitzavim-Vayelech. I remember that the rabbi at Temple Om Hadash talked about smittah, the Sabbatical year, the 7th year when the land is to rest, but heck if I remember what he said! The rabbi has this penchant for injecting his beliefs into a Torah reading, which effectively lifts me out of living Torah and back into the world of the rational. He has referred more than once to the stories in the Bible as myths. That is what I remember of his teaching. And I wish he would stop. I wish he would stop because I find it offensive and aggravating.

A couple of Pesachs ago, Rabbi David Wolpe engendered a major brouhaha in stating categorically, during Passover, that the events of the Exodus did not happen as described, if they ever did happen, because no one has found any evidence and because of the story's inherent contradictions ; the experts agree, it probably didn't happen the way the Bible tells it. The immediate rational response to that is to point out that archeological evidence for the Exodus has not been discovered, yet. After all, when does archeological exploration reach a dead end? When someone says so? Or is it when the entire earth has been dug up? I am not arguing that the Exodus happened exactly as written. Yet, something happened. And that's all we can probably hang our hats on, for the moment. And that's okay by me. A happening is always filled with limitless possibility and life. The Exodus is just as alive today as it was back then. It is eternal, as all our deepest truths are.

But a myth is not a truth. Nor is an "extended metaphor", as some have described the Bible. They are descriptors and the tools of reason. I would say that the kind of analysis that declares from the outset, that a Biblical story is a myth or a metaphor, does not raise the level of interpetation beyond p'shat (literal, or simple meaning of the text). Rational explanations really do not rise higher than the plain meaning; in fact, the rational and the simple, I would venture to say, are kissing cousins.

I now understand the rabbi's personal conception of G-d: to him G-d is love. He said so. This also became apparent in studying the final passages of the portion:

And I will hide My face on that day, because of all the evil they have committed, when they turned to other deities. (Vayelech 31:17)

The rabbi countered it with a passage from Deuteronomy:

And these words which I command you this day shall be on your heart. (Deuteronomy 6:6)

He asks, "Why is it not stated, in your heart rather than on"? His answer is that Torah is always there, as is G-d, encompassing everything, waiting for your heart to open. Or, as R' Mendel of Kotzk so eloquently put it:

Why are we instructed to put the words on our hearts and not in our hearts? Of course they should be in your heart, but that is not always possible. At the very least you can put them on your heart and they may just sit there for a very long time. Some day your heart will open and be ready to receive those words, and if they are already on top of your heart, they can slip right in." (Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk, Torah Gems p203)(Secondary Source)

So far, so good. Because it was the anniversary of 9/11, those thoughts were not far from our hearts either. Referring to the idea of G-d hiding His face when bad things happen to good people, a congregant wondered if G-d, like a parent, sometimes gets confused about what His children, are doing and is not certain of how to respond. Perhaps that is why phenomena like hurricanes and natural disasters strike- as a result of G-d's confusion. I, personally, loved her take on it, even though I might not agree with it. G-d was so immediate to her, in her understanding. In fact, when I read the Torah, G-d evolves as much as human beings do, in terms of His relationship with them. And how does he identify Himself to us, by what name? As a verb: eyeheh asher eyeheh, "I shall be as I shall be".

Here is the rabbi's take on it:
G-d does not abandon. G-d does not Hide His face. G-d does not punish. The Biblical G-d is the projection of the culture that set down the written Torah. A punishing G-d is a primitive G-d. In the olden days, people found answers to tragedy by believing that their failings stirred G-d's wrath. They projected their feelings, thoughts, concepts onto G-d. Hence, we attribute tragedies like the destruction of the Second Temple to baseless hatred, which in turn stirred G-d's wrath, and subsequent events. So now, to join mythology, we have psychoanalysis to explain G-d's being in the world.

This is what projection is: Imagine that G-d is a blank movie screen and you are the projector. The film is whatever is going on in your inner world. No matter what the Torah says or how the world behaves towards you, you are projecting your own inner world on G-d and events. Attempts to explain G-d's behaviour, or lack thereof, is a defence mechanism on your part. It is neurosis. I don't think so. But that is what "projection" really means. And it places an artificial mechitzah between G-d and the individual. Projection, by the way, is a theory, not a scientifically proven fact, and not half as engaging as a midrash.

What G-d really is, according to the rabbi, is love. Nothing but love. He compared G-d's love to warm chocolate sauce, or heavenly caramel, a thick and velvety and flowing syrup, filling the spaces, carressing you and your heart, waiting to be let in. Hmm.

Here's my take on myths and extended metaphors and film:
I have no doubt that all of us sometimes project our inner worlds on G-d. Especially as long as there is Him, and me, or as Buber liked to put it, I and Thou. The sweetness of G-d? There are moments where an encounter with G-d seems sweet. But what about the fear of G-d? Real genuine, yirah, not just awe? How to explain that? Is that too, a projection? Is G-d as a chocolate sundae, too, a projection? Or just an entity with "unconditional positive regard"? Is that the same as the Ein Sof, or one of its sefirot?

If G-d is love and only love then where does the covenant fit in? Is this the way we Jewishly relate to G-d? Does this mean that the Torah, at best, is an approximation of truth? How does this differ from the Reconstructionist view of Judaism as a religious civilisation? All peoples have myths. Where does truth lie, then?

I find it interesting that the book containing the Exodus is titled "Shmot" which means "names". I suspect that when we truly grasp Torah, or more accurately, when Torah grasps/possesses us, that at heart the Exodus, like G-d's name, is a verb as well- the Exodus "shall be as it shall be"- an eternal promise and its fulfillment, made by G-d, in G-d.

One day, immersed in an ocean of Torah, far, far away beyond the land of myth, I realised that the relationship between Torah and us was like a Rorschach test with one amazing difference: Torah projects upon us; we, each, are the ambiguous inkblot, waiting to be interpreted; we are the blank screen waiting to receive and to be made into a film, into a story, into living Torah.

Myth or extended metaphor are not at all vehicles to the living truth. It cannot be reached by rationales; it is received through G-d's favour. I think that G-d has the last word, which is pretty well reflected in the Priestly Blessing- even an open heart does not guarantee G-d's favour, even when we work hard at it. Furthermore, G-d is equally as capable of hardening a heart, though perhaps you have to be pretty far gone, a là Pharoah. And Torah, if we grasp it, and hold onto it, reveals the deepest truth of who we are, in its proper season: our real, living names. Every moment, the dead are raised.